


the saddest fate

by au_spice



Category: Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika | Puella Magi Madoka Magica
Genre: Alternate Canon, Alternate Timelines, Angst, Emotional Hurt, Eventual Fluff, Existential Angst, F/F, Help, Hurt/Comfort, Magical Girls, Magical gays, Non-Linear Narrative, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Suicidal Thoughts, Tags Are Hard, Temporary Character Death, Time Travel, Why Did I Write This?, disaster gays: magical girl edition, fluff if you look at one sentence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-26
Updated: 2019-05-13
Packaged: 2019-10-16 09:36:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17547182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/au_spice/pseuds/au_spice
Summary: Her eyes roll up to the murky sky; begs a god that doesn’t exist because somewhere out there, there has to be a timeline where she and happiness can coexist.





	1. prelude

**Author's Note:**

> fic name is just a stand in; there may or may not be a title change once i figure out a more appropriate one?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this first chapter is mainly just a rewrite of canon material, but all the shits gonna go down in the next chapter.  
> lots of angst. have fun.

* * *

zero.

* * *

 

In Mitakihara, when Walpurgisnacht comes, all hell breaks loose.

Buildings fall, the pavement crumbles, people die...

_ People die _ — that’s the part that Homura finds hardest to come to terms with. 

The world around her seems to spontaneously break to useless pieces. Mami’s cold, dead body bleeds out into a red sea, and she can only watch as overhead, one remaining magical girl soars through the air in a useless battle against the inevitable. Hope drains from her chest with every used up Grief Seed that drops from the skies and every sound of faint, choked back pain. And through all that death and destruction, all she can think is  _ just how did things come to this?  _ Two weeks ago, all three of them were eating cake in Mami’s house; Homura had even started thinking of becoming a magical girl herself. 

A flash of pink crashes and tumbles through the sky, a tangle of limbs flimsily tumbling about before finally hitting the ground.

It splashes into a layer of water, the  _ ocean _ of flooding that covers the ruins below. 

Madoka Kaname’s body leaves a crater in the ground and a hole in Homura’s heart. Homura rushes over and dips her hands in the water, falls to her knees and cradles the top half of Madoka’s body. She pushes her fingers and feels around for a pulse; she desperately searches for any sign of life, frantically looks for a surge of warmth in her hands, a twinge of muscle, a heartbeat. Anything.

But instead, all she feels is the warmth of life fading away from the body, and the wide eyes of the girl whom she’d loved so much become marble— beautiful, but stone. She can still see the fear Madoka must have felt in her last moments and looking away, she brings her hand up to close the body’s eyes. And then a tremor wracks through her body. Her sobs reverberate throughout the terribly lonely space she’s in. It’s ugly and loud, but no one is left to hear it; no one’s alive to hear it. 

“It should’ve been me.” She presses her head down to Madoka’s chest and her face comes off drenched in red; scarlet, crimson,  _ cruel red _ . She screams, “If I could pick between saving your life versus mine… I would have chosen yours no matter what, over and over,  _ every time _ .”

Somewhere in the back of her head, she knew that neither Mami or Madoka’s death had to do with her. Whether or not she died that night, Walpurgisnacht would have come to Mitakihara and whether or not she died, Mami and Madoka would have taken it upon their kind hearts to defend the city. The helplessness only serves to make her grieve more, cry more, hold on to Madoka’s shredded and blood-soaked clothes tighter. She shakes the corpse, shouts at it like her anguish will somehow spark it back to life, “did it have to be you? It couldn’t have been me?! I… I…  _ I _ wanted you to live…!”

...

“Do you truly mean that? Would your cause be worth even your very life?” Homura turns around to see Kyubey standing on a destroyed column. The creature slowly advances, “if you are willing to risk it all, form a contract with me.”

“Would my wish change this fate?” She meets his gaze with wide eyes; scared eyes, desperate and— worst of all—  _ naive _ . 

“If that is your will.”

“Then,” Homura starts. She lets down Madoka and stands up, “I wish that I could redo my meeting with Madoka and that I’ll have the strength to protect her from this fate.”

Following her words, a flash erupts from her chest and her vision goes blinding white, _ searing _ white as a roaring pain erupts throughout her entire being. 

And then it all dies into nothing.

* * *

one.

* * *

 

They fall beside each other, soul gems as muddled as the water they find themselves in. Mitakihara lays in ruins around them; disfigured and ugly buildings, crippled buildings, fallen buildings. Homura turns her head and takes a glance at Madoka’s gem, “No more grief seeds?”

“No more.”

“That’s fine,” Homura shuts her eyes. She finds herself feeling an ironic sense of peacefulness. Things didn’t work out the way she wanted them to, but… “I’m glad I’ll at least be with you.”

“Me, too,” a tear slides out from the corner of Madoka’s eyes. She turns away.

“Madoka?”

There’s silence. A whimper catches in her throat. “I don’t want to die, but if I have you by my side, Homura… I think I’d be okay with it.”

“I—” A rush of energy fills her chest. She looks down at her soul gem and finds Madoka’s hand holding a grief seed to it. Black wisps seep out of the gem, restoring it to its original pristine hue. The realization hits her, “you told me you didn’t have any more grief seeds.”

“Sorry, Homura,” Madoka faces her once more and rasps, “I lied. It was good enough for one more use... one of us needs to live.”

“NO—”

The soul gem beside her begins to turn into a deeper shade of pink and Madoka writhes in agony. Her expression becomes pained; deep wrinkles crease her features.

“Madoka?!”

A scream rips through the air.

* * *

five.

* * *

 

Again?

Again.

Homura starts feeling a sickening sense of deja vu. 

Mami’s corpse tints the water red, her head smashed in with more fractures than times Homura’s lived this moment. The remaining two lie side by side on the cold, damp ground.

Only this time, their soul gems are balled up in fists. Anger.

“Kyubey tricked us… didn’t he?” Madoka’s voice shakes, “I don’t— I don’t want this. I don’t want to hurt anyone. I don’t want what happened to Sayaka to happen to me! I don’t want to become a witch.”

It hurts Homura to see her like this. “You’ll have me. We can both be witches. Get revenge on this unfair world.”

Madoka goes quiet. It’s an ominous silence.

“Shoot me,” she finally replies. For a second, Homura feels like she’s been socked in the gut. 

Kill Madoka? All she can remember is  _ how many times _ in  _ how many ways _ she’s seen Madoka die already, and then that’s all it takes for her to vigorously shake her head. 

“I can’t… I could never…” 

“Please, Homura,” she pleads, “you can still use magic, right? I’m scared,  _ please _ —”

“Madoka, I love you.” 

Her eyes go wide, and then she smiles. There’s something reassuring about that smile; like some kind of fucked up drug, it’s the only thing Homura needs, “Homura, nothing you do could ever hurt me.”

“Is this what you really want?”

“Yes.”

There’s a shift in the water when the dark-haired girl stands up and for a second, that’s who she really is— some little girl forced in an endless, violent uphill battle. A little girl who’s shaking, crying, and scared for her life. A little girl, a  _ child _ , who’s seen so much violence and death that the only thing keeping her going is a futile ember of hope flickering weakly against the winds of violent, cruel fate. She reaches into the device attached at her forearm and draws out a gun.  _ Click _ ; cocks the gun. Her forefinger pulls the slack on the trigger, then fires, hand blown back by the recoil.

The bullet hits Madoka’s arm instead of the soul gem. It takes a second to process; one excruciating second. She can see her biting back the scream.

“I… I missed?” A tear slides down Homura’s cheek, “I’m so sorry, so, so sorry…  _ I can’t do anything right. _ ”

“It’s okay, it’s okay. It doesn’t hurt. Just try again,” Despite being quick to reassure her, nothing could erase the pain on Madoka’s face. She groans a little as she props herself up, and holds her tainted soul gem up to the gun’s barrel to ensure that the next shot wouldn’t miss it’s mark. She presses their foreheads together and places her hands on Homura’s shoulders as if to steady them. She repeats, softer and more hesitant this time, “try again.”

“I’m… I’m scared.” 

“Please, Homura,” Madoka winces and her next words come out strained, “I don’t have much time.”

Homura cocks the gun again, fast and desperate. Her finger moves on its own.

_ Bang _ .

The life in Madoka’s eyes die out in the blink of an eye. Blank, hollow eyes; stomped out embers. The husk slumps onto Homura’s knelt figure as she sobs, “forgive me.”

* * *

 ninety-seven.

* * *

 

Homura has done this month over almost a hundred times. She’s seen the love of her life die in her face almost a hundred times. At this point, she can only tell herself,  _ there’s still a chance _ .

Everyone’s dead. She fights Walpurgisnacht alone.

_ There’s still a chance _ .

She’s gone through these motions too many times, starts to predict what the witch is going to do and where, and she’s got a goddamn arsenal in her little pocket dimension. She’s the army; one-man army, and this isn’t a fight she’s going to lose. It doesn’t matter how many missile launchers she has to pull out, how many times she gets straight up  _ pelted _ by a building, or crushed into the ground. 

One grief seed, three grief seeds, twenty grief seeds.

They litter the ground in intervals of about one every five minutes and she continues her fights. Countless missile launches, explosives— they all make their mark.

Every moment starts to blend into the next one and she’s not sure how long she has to fight, but she’s determined that this will be the last timeline. It has to be, because she doesn’t know what to do if it isn’t; it’s better to not think of such a possibility at all. She’s going to go crazy if she has to do everything over, because with every timeline, she’s not sure if the endings she rewrites are getting better or worse.

In the midst of her thoughts, a building smacks into her and sends her flying into a pile of debris. She winces—  _ shake it off, shake it off _ — and pushes herself up.

But she can’t.

A piece of debris pins her leg down. Out of all things, a  _ piece of concrete  _ is what stops her from saving Madoka. She tries to slide her leg out, tries to lift it up, but to no avail. She falls back and stops struggling. Her eyes roll up to the murky sky; begs a god that doesn’t exist because somewhere out there, there  _ has _ to be a timeline where she and happiness can coexist.

It’s just not here.

Is it anywhere?

If such a world is impossible, then what’s the point?

What is she even fighting for?

Despair— ninety-seven months worth of anguish— festers in her chest. Her face scrunches up in frustration, she clenches her soul gem in her fist as if she intends to break it to pieces. She slams her fist into the pile of crushed steel behind her; she curses her fate. The earth rotates, the sun sets, and Homura Akemi is still trapped in Mitakihara, in the exact same month, in the exact same year, and  _ nothing will ever change _ .

Her soul gem darkens into a muted, dark mauve. She doesn’t care. Let it break. She’ll become a witch that will curse humanity because there was only one thing in the world she ever wanted and even Kyubey couldn’t grant it. Despair creeps over her soul, taints and dyes it black. It moves its way up, filling her with to the brim with sorrow. Its ascent stops abruptly to the sound of footsteps echoing through the emptiness Mitakihara had become. A hand grasps at her, pulling her out of the darkness and back into reality.

Homura opens her eyes to see the pair of kind doe eyes that she loves so much. 

The darkness recedes.

“Madoka…?”

“Homura,” she responds softly, like Homura is something fragile, something precious, “thank you. Thank you for everything you’ve done up until now.”

She stands up and turns her back to the magical girl. Kyubey saunters up to the pair and then stops before turning his head towards Homura in silent acknowledgment. Nothing about his face changes, but there’s something condescending and smug about it.

“Don’t tell me…”

“I’m sorry, Homura. I’m going to become a magical girl.”

She can almost pinpoint the exact moment her heart tears into two, “but…”

“I know,” Madoka clasps her hands over her chest, “it’s just that I’ve found something worth wishing for.”

“No—” Homura props herself up on her arms and starts shouting, her tone gets desperate and anxious just like the squeamish little girl she was over ninety months ago, “don’t you remember everything I’ve told you?! Nothing is worth the cost of a contract with Kyubey! Please, please,  _ please _ , Madoka…”

“I’m tired of everyone around me dying. I don’t want to see this pain and suffering anymore, Homura, please forgive me,” she turns around and gives that apologetic smile that Homura has seen ninety-seven too many times. Kyubey springs up to her and she bends down to his level, “Kyubey, can I truly wish for anything?”

The response is automatic. “With all that potential you have, anything is possible.”

“Then, I wish…”

_ No, no, no.  _ Homura searches for an answer. She points her gun at Kyubey, and then lowers it. What’s the point of murdering him if there’s spares? There’s nothing she can do to change Madoka’s mind.

There’s no other choice.

“I’m sorry, Madoka. I can’t let this happen to you.”

The cogs of time turn once more.

* * *

ninety-eight.

* * *

 

 


	2. we grow until we die.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> to be immortal is to cease growth; and yet, to cease growth is to die.

* * *

 ninety-eight.

* * *

Deep in a pocket of reality, cotton balls with mustaches dance and cake falls from the sky. Familiars soar through the skies of Charlotte’s labyrinth, they swarm a lone magical girl who warps from one place to the next within an instant. They attack empty spaces, one after another, before inevitably getting blown up by a bomb that wasn’t there a split second ago.

Homura slowly advances to the center of the labyrinth in a lonely battle, a steady grind to obtain her next Grief Seed. There are twenty in her own pocket dimension at the moment; twenty witches hunted in a day. Her lungs ache with a burning intensity.

It’s just as Kyubey said: she’s fine as long as her soul gem is. It doesn’t matter how much she’s sweat out, how many hours she spends pushing her body to the limits. Her heart beats beneath the beaten and bruised skin, chest heaving with the effort of overworked lungs. No matter how many thorns pierce her skin, or how many fresh wounds there are to drain the red from her skin, she’s alive. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.

The vengeance unloads clips into the familiars—crushes their disintegrating carcasses under sharp heels as she finally descends upon the heart of the labyrinth.

It’s a strangely warm and welcoming room, with a tall table and stools in the middle. Cakes and desserts line the walls as the colorful designs shift and move. Her heels clack on the checkered tile and she spots a ragdoll sitting atop the nearest stool. She’s seen it too many times to fall for it. _Cheap ploy._

Her environment turns gray as the world around her freezes. She fits a bomb snugly into the doll’s stitched, gaping mouth as her surroundings regain its colour; time starts ticking and so does that bomb—only mere seconds elapse before shreds of fabric explode into the air like morbid confetti. It’s a robotic, automatic process: freeze time, attack, watch the fireworks. She pulls out an assault rifle that’s already loaded, and all she needs to do is turn around and pull the trigger at the witch’s true form pulling up behind her. She knows the drill, knows every little trick Charlotte has up her sleeve. The witch recoils and once the fire ceases, she lunges forward with her mouth wide open, halting mid-air only to resume with a grenade in her mouth instead of a body. Shreds of skin and darkness splatter all over the ground, all over the walls, all over Homura’s costume. Slowly, the odd colourful environment that the labyrinth presented recedes and fades back into the abandoned building it originally was.

Throughout all this, Homura feels cold and empty; jaded. She looks down at the back of her hand then at the grief seed on the ground. She picks it up and holds the grief seed to it, but only a little bit of the taint leaves the soul gem.

She holds it there, starts pressing harder like the seed would be more effective that way.

Nothing.

Like an oil stain on white cloth, the slight muddle in her soul remains. She clicks her tongue in annoyance and slips the grief seed back into her pockets, figuring that there’s still plenty of room for future use.

A shadow appears beside hers. The silhouette is all too familiar—the four legs, the petit body, and the floating rings encircling floppy ears. Kyubey approaches her, but keeps his distance. “A magical girl? I don’t recall making a contract with you.”

Homura feels hostility boiling in her chest. Her face immediately scrunches up into a scowl at the sight of him, and she raises her gun at him on instinct. She spits out, _“disappear from my sight.”_

He speaks as he dodges the bullets. His movements are seamless, and Homura doesn’t want to waste magic on making sure she hits her mark, “that’s interesting… maybe I formed the contract so long ago that I forgot? That’s impossible, though. I never forget.”

“Shut up,” she threatens, “I’m really going to kill you.”

“You’re clearly not new to this. You already know that can’t happen,” Kyubey’s tone is monotone as ever, but his words still manage to sound patronizing all the same, “or are you just that desperate?”

Homura replies with a click of her gun, aligns the sights right in between Kyubey’s annoying little beady eyes.

“I don’t know what you’re trying to achieve with all this effort, but fate is an inevitable truth. It’d be good to know that,” the creature holds her gaze before he swirls around and starts to take his leave. His tail sways behind him, “but I have a feeling that you already do.”

Homura tunes him out halfway through his first sentence and lets him leave. She can’t get rid of Kyubey, but she can make sure that one: she’ll have allies to defeat Walpurgisnacht in this timeline, two: she’ll be strong enough to get rid of Walpurgisnacht on her own this time if one doesn’t pan out, and most importantly…

Three: Madoka Kaname will never become a magical girl as long as she is alive and well; Homura would sooner let her soul wither and rot away...

 _But then_ , she thinks, turning the muddled soul gem about in her palm. No matter what angle she holds it at, it fails to gleam like it did before in that dim warehouse lighting.

_Isn’t that what I’m already doing?_

* * *

four.

* * *

The pair sits on top of a skyscraper, on top of the world, on top of the clouds, feeling invincible.

Madoka balances a grief seed on the top of her hand; it sits there for a brief second before tipping over. Her fingers close up on it and she tucks it away, “I’ll save it for later.”

“Always good to save up,” Homura replies cheerily. There’s nothing better than alone with Madoka like this. They could talk about anything, and she’d be happy.

Madoka laughs, but it’s more of a soft and nervous chuckle than anything. Her smile disappears, quickly wilting and it’s at this moment that Homura starts to feel uneasy. She hesitates for a second, and then says slowly, carefully, “just in case anything happens to me… you know where I keep my grief seeds, right? Take them, if anything happens.”

“Wha… what are you talking about?” the bespectacled one stutters. Nervous laughter dribbles from her lips in splutters, like a struggling engine that can’t seem to start up properly. It takes a moment, but she recovers, “I mean, yeah… yeah, I know where you keep them, but… what’s with this all of a sudden?”

“Just in case,” the girl repeats, she looks down at the ground below her. Homura stares intently, and then Madoka holds her gaze for a split second. In response, the pink-clad girl shakes her head and suddenly breaks down, finally confiding, “I’m… I’m just scared… Homura, I’m scared.”

“What do you have to be scared about?”

“I almost died just now,” she whispers, and then shouts pushing her face into her hands, “Homura, I almost died. That witch just now… if Mami was a _split second_ late in saving me, I would’ve been mince-meat. Witch food; down the gullet. I know that I signed up for this, but is it bad that I’m starting to regret it? I thought that… I thought I could be as strong as Mami, or determined like Sayaka, or even as hardworking as you, but I’m still just me. And I’m terrified for my life.”

“Madoka—”

“I don’t want to live like this anymore,” Madoka draws her face from her hands to reveal puffy eyes, and slowly stands up. Her toes edge towards the streets below, like the concrete ground beckons her, tempts her with a Witch’s Kiss, “always betting with my life on the line. Every day.”

“Stop,” Homura whispers weakly; a rusted wheel, squeaking and forced into motion. She reaches out and her fingers close on Madoka’s wrist, pulling with a few gentle tugs, “Madoka… you’re not thinking straight.”

Her right foot steps forward and lingers in the empty air for a second. Homura tightens her grip. After a passing moment that feels more like a decade, her eyes finally blink back to life. They come back into focus like a pair of faulty lens. She shakes her head and sets her foot back on the ground, stepping back from the ledge.

“Sorry, Homura,” she mumbles, but her words feel empty and insincere. She forces the slightest sign of a smile, “I’m not in a good headspace right now… I just. Need some time on my own.”

There’s a thoughtful silence before Homura carefully responds, “... okay. Please take care of yourself.”

“I will,” Madoka straightens up, regaining the cheerful composure that she seemed to face every situation with, “don’t worry, Homura! I was just a little shaken by that close call.”

That’s the Madoka Kaname that Homura had always known. A Madoka that only ever responds to the glaring depths of despair and gloom with as much optimism and determination as is needed to defeat it. In the face of death, she always bounces back with more hope and cheer than ever before, and Homura always tries to match that effort in her own subtle way. That is their dynamic, and even a hint of that normalcy Homura has always known is enough to put her at ease.

Except, after that lonely night on the rooftop beneath a vast, dark expanse of stars, Homura never saw the sparkling, effervescent girl she knew again.

(when you stop growing, you are dead.)

(death isn’t a possibility for homura, but neither is growth.)

_(so what’s left?)_

* * *

ninety-eight.

* * *

“... boys, if there’s _anything_ you must know in life, it’s that you must _never_ be picky about the way that your eggs are prepared!” Ms. Saotome’s voice cuts through the room, tongue sharp with a rage that the class had not felt in about three months—or whenever the teacher’s last unfortunate breakup had been, “if any of you ever come to harbor the _audacity_ to argue with a woman solely on the basis of how she cooks her eggs, I will not hesitate to come to your house myself and…”

As much as Madoka tries to stay focused on Ms. Saotome’s words, she eventually finds her train of thought getting off-track. She could only listen to her teacher ramble about her newest ex for so long before the lecture got boring, and often her rants were about mundane, small things. She oft wonders if the breakup is truly over something as trivial as eggs rather than merely an accumulation of small things, but never questions Ms. Saotome lest she suffer from the misfortune of being exposed to more of the woman’s wrath than she already has.

“... ah, right! Also, we have a transfer student today!” Ms. Saotome’s announcement earns a few laughs from the class.

“Shouldn’t you have brought that up first?” one of the students calls out of turn.

Ms. Saotome dismissively coughs and continues, “ _anyway_ , Miss Homura Akemi, feel free to step into the class now.”

The name catches Madoka’s attention, snapping her out of her daydream. It’s a strange name, and she would definitely remember it if she’d ever known someone by that name… but she doesn’t. The familiarity of it bugs her, like there’s something she just has to remember but can’t recall. It feels vaguely important, but gives up after thinking about it for a while. She sinks down in her seat.

Walking over to the door, the woman opens it and takes a peek into the corridor, “Homura Akemi?”

No one answers. Whispers start to fill the silence. Out of nowhere, Sayaka leans out of her seat towards Madoka, “looks like the transfer student is absent.”

Madoka replies vaguely, “guess so.”

“Must be a troubled kid, missing their first day here like that.” Sayaka mumbles, and then leans back into her seat before boldly (but quietly) declaring, “if it’s someone troublesome, I’ll make sure they never lay a hand on my precious Madoka!”

“Sayaka,” Madoka chirps laughter and insists, “I can take care of myself! Maybe the student had a good reason to miss class, anyway.”

“Yeah, yeah,” her blue-haired friend leans back in her chair. Sayaka’s feet sway carelessly with no end, not unlike a pendulum, “who knows. We’ll see tomorrow—or whenever they decide to come to class.”

“Well, when she does, let’s do our best to make her feel welcome, alright?” Hitomi cuts in.

“Of course, of course,” Sayaka concedes, albeit half-heartedly.

Despite how the day seems to have started off so oddly, the rest of it turns out to be rather ordinary. Ms. Saotome sprinkles petty remarks about her ex throughout her lectures, Hitomi is her usual kind and soft-spoken self, and Sayaka is, well… Sayaka. The day had been so mundane that after some hours of the usual routine, any mention of Homura Akemi had become long forgotten.

“Hey, Madoka! Wait up!” Sayaka runs up to her, “you wanna walk home together afterschool?”

“Hm?” she blinks, and after a moment of thought, “ah, no, it’s okay. I have something to pick up from the store.”

“You know I wouldn’t mind waiting.”

“It’s fine. Aren’t you going to see Kyosuke today, anyway?”

“Yeah,” Sayaka shrugs, “if you insist. Just be careful on your way home, alright?”

“Of course! You, too.”

“If any bad guys come after me, I’ll beat them!”

The remark earns a laugh. “Yeah, yeah. See you tomorrow, Sayaka.”

“See ya!”

Madoka smiles as she walks off, backpack slung over her shoulders carelessly.

The sun is setting when she finishes running her errands, and she starts heading home with two fistfuls of groceries in her hands. It’s a heavy load, and she’s starting to wish she had made Sayaka tag along with her. As much as she had to think about, she could really only ponder by herself for so long before getting bored.

On her usual route home, the streets seem oddly desolate. There’s no one walking on the sidewalks, and there were few cars nearby; an odd occurrence for the often busy streets of Mitakihara. A profound feeling of dread started to fill the pit of her stomach.

 _‘I should go back_ ,’ she thinks to herself after walking down yet another street without a single person in sight, _‘this is starting to feel unsafe.’_

The schoolgirl spins on her heels and starts walking a little faster towards the more populated streets that she had just passed while looking around warily for any suspicious figures. Balancing all the groceries onto one hand, she slips her phone out of her pocket.

No service.

Out of nowhere, the air fills with the sound of shrieking bats and her surroundings warp into something along the lines of disfigured child art. Patches of fabric replace the darkened sky, and the tall buildings that once surrounded her seconds ago are now nowhere to be seen. She instead finds herself standing near columns of dark scribbles. The streets below her turn to paper; white marked by scratches of colorful crayon. Strange figures begin to fill the air, manifesting as nonsensical doodles before slowly forming into something tangible. They turn into floating silhouettes, drenched in an inky blackness.

Shortly after their materialization, the shadows melt away to reveal benevolent-looking ragdolls, limbs loosely held together by frayed thread and messy stitching. The dolls’ mouths fall open as though laughing, and they start to encircle Madoka.

The girl stands there, frozen in fear with wide eyes as they start to close in. Ghosts? Demons? She looks down and notices something off about her own appearance. A bold curve starts to line her figure, like an outline for a child’s drawing. The shadows on her person start to lose their definition, becoming almost wobbly.

Chittering, the small familiars begin their assault. Despite the clamp of their teeth on her skin and their relentless attack, Madoka finds that she feels no pain worse than a small prick or a vague ache. Nonetheless, the absurdity of the situation is enough to warrant a scream.

“Someone,” she screams, arms raised in defense against the witch familiars, “someone help! _Anyone_!”

She hollers until she feels lightheaded, and then stops. Peering through her arms, she finds that the apparitions have grown more demonic in appearance. A lash of one of their tails sends her falling backwards onto her back. Her skin starts to bleed out its hues like bad watercolour. Sobs choking out from her throat, Madoka can only find the situation terribly sad. To die without a clue as to what’s going on.

Her arms fall to the ground in resignation and the beasts swarm her with lashing claws and clamping teeth.

* * *

ninety-seven

* * *

Smoke wafts off the end of Homura’s gun as it clatters to the ground. Her shaky breaths turn into desperate gasps, then wracking sobs. Her hands shake and she looks down to see them caked in blood.

Eyes blurred with tears, her gaze moves to Madoka’s motionless body. A carmine stream drips from a hole in the girl’s head. Red blood, filthy blood, everywhere. Painting the ground, filling the endless skies, collecting on the ground. On Madoka. “I…”

Through his nonexistent throat, Kyubey whistles and plops down beside her. He’s dangerously close; a reckless move given the circumstances, “fascinating. I did not expect for you to actually do it.”

“I…” _had to do it._ Homura crawls over and clenches Madoka’s soaked shirt in her hands, “I told her not to do it, and yet…”

“And yet you shot her.” Kyubey finishes for her, slow and cruel. His words cut like a hot knife through butter.

“You gave me no choice.” Homura looks up, and balls her right hand into a fist. Pure hatred fills up her chest. The beginnings of a shadow begin to form in her soul.

“Well, what are you going to do now?” His tail sways from side to side, “will you give in to despair from here? I can’t even begin to imagine how many times you’ve relived this day, and for what?”

Homura’s fingers tighten over the handle of her pistol. It hurts. It hurts. It _hurts_. “Shut up.”

“However, I will give you some credit. You certainly took a bigger chunk out of Walpurgisnacht then I expected. Love truly is a powerful thing, isn’t it? No sane person would willingly put themselves through all of this… but isn’t it about time you’ve given up? I’m sure you’ve tried everything in the book at this point.” Kyubey starts to trod away now, “Now, go ahead. Give up. Become the greatest witch you can be. I need the energy, after all—”

In one swift motion, Homura’s arm swings out and a bullet finds its place square between Kyubey’s eyes. The body falls to the ground, but by the time a double pops into reality, Homura Akemi is long, long gone.

* * *

ninety-eight.

* * *

Through the shadows hovering over Madoka’s face, a purple light flashes through and blinds her eyes. The light, acting as though it had any sort of physical shape to it, caused the figures scrambling above her to fly off or stop moving altogether, and she felt an immense force pounding her into the crayon-covered ground. Loud shots ring through the air; the creature clawing at her face, the last one alive, stops moving and soon all the stagnant bodies disintegrate into the air one by one. Upon the disappearance of the strange manifestations, her body begins to regain its original shape and colour as if the two effects had some obscure, puzzling connection to each other.

With nothing screaming or crawling on her face, Madoka could now see clearly. She sits up and looks around to see who—or what—saved her.

A petite figure, as if belonging to a high school girl, stands in the shadow of a painted streetlight. The girl seems to be around Madoka’s age, and she’s absolutely…

_Breathtaking._

Her hair cuts off at her lower-back; it’s a deep purple, just like her eyes. Her apparel is odd, torn all over and coated with soot and dirt. It looks somewhat like a schoolgirl uniform, but isn’t one. Her gaze holds cold, calculating, aloof; yet all the intimidation in her face melts away when she and Madoka make eye contact. There’s a flicker of recognition in her face, eyes widening for a second before the same shuttered expression presents itself once more.

Madoka looks around in bewilderment, though the odd appearance her surroundings took on remain as they were. Hesitantly, she starts, “Thanks for saving me, but...”

“Leave,” the other cuts her off, lips quirking down into a pained frown. She starts to walk away, headed in the same direction Madoka was going in. Her teeth grind against each other, biting back words that Madoka can only wonder about before she finally demands, “run home and forget about this.” The girl’s voice runs smooth, taking a deep breath to conceal the minute crack in it.

“Who… who are you?” Her savior seems displeased, only looking slightly appeased when Madoka takes her first step back away from her.

“I mean it when I tell you to forget everything.” It sounds like a threat this time.

Homura blinks, stunned at the animosity. Such a bitter and cold disposition, and so calm for someone who appears to be the same age as her.

A thought strikes her, “could you be… Miss Akemi?”

There’s a flicker of something inscrutable in those deep, violet eyes, “no. Leave now, before you’re dead.”

“Are you going to stay here or—”

She gets interrupted by a gun barrel, pointed straight at her. The girl’s voice sounds different this time, frantic and desperate. “I mean it. Leave and forget all about this.”

The gun sets her on edge, Madoka freezes in fear for a moment but stands her ground, “why do you insist on going alone? Aren’t you scared?”

“I’ll be more than fine. Don’t worry about me,” her face tenses. Teeth bared, the odd girl finally repeats, “leave. This is my final warning to you.”

Madoka pauses, staring with curious, wide eyes until a bullet impacts the ground two inches from her toes. She staggers back in shock before turning tail and running, surprised and confused. Just who was that?

And why did she feel so unnecessarily worried for someone she didn’t even know?

* * *

Nervous tremors wrack Homura’s body as she watches Madoka run off. She sucks in a few deep breaths, gaze aimed downwards at the gun shaking profusely in her hands, cold hands clenched until her knuckles turned white. Madoka’s absence leaves a lonely hole in Homura’s heart, bitter as defeat and deep as the void. She never meant to resort to force, but that familiar naive stubbornness she saw in those magenta eyes had elicited an uncharacteristic desperation. She falls to her knees as the gun clatters to the ground. Burying her face in her hands, an animalistic, agonized sound escapes from her lips. The look of pure shock in Madoka’s face comes back to mind, and the moment when she shot at the ground by her feet replays itself in slow motion.

Truly, she never meant to hurt Madoka. She doesn’t want Madoka to hate her.

But it’s all she can do to save her life.

“Well, well, well,” a silky voice coos from the dark. Homura lifts her face from her palms and turns around. She moves quick, getting to her feet before the newcomer even finishes her sentence, “what do we have here?”

Mami steps out from below the streetlights armed with a pair of muskets. Her index fingers fiddle around with the trigger, but she doesn’t point the white barrel at Homura. Not yet. “Staying here like a sitting duck… did the tough life of hunting down witches already get to you?”

Even though Homura has, accumulatively, been a magical girl infinitely longer than Mami has at this point. Offhandedly, she curtly responds, “You could say that.”

“You’ve definitely been on a grind, it seems.” Mami hums in agreement, continuing, “it’s funny that Kyubey hasn’t told me about you until today. Skipping school to hunt witches; how devoted of you.”

“Mind your own business.”

“You’ve got some nerve for someone who’s trespassing on my territory,” Mami’s eyes narrow.

Homura runs her hands through her hair, stares at the ends of it like there isn’t anything else interesting enough to earn her attention. “This place is infested with witches. Didn’t know you liked leaving your place messy like that.”

“Are you trying to pick a fight?”

“No.” _No use picking fights I already know the outcome of._ A humorless smile comes to her face. “I’m just messing around.”

Mami’s expression remains impassive, but she doesn’t respond.

“If you want, I’ll leave this witch to you. I’ve got plenty of grief seeds, anyway.” Homura offers. For a second, she’d forgotten that she’s trying to make allies, not enemies.

“Not that you’re in any condition to deal with it, anyway,” Homura can hear the blonde mumble, but lets it go.

“Be careful out there.” Homura waves her hand, turns around and starts to walk off. She adds dryly, “I’ll be counting on you.”

“Yeah, yeah. Farewell. Quit hunting on my grounds while you’re at it, won’t you?”

“I’m sure both of us can find the space to share.”

“You’re hogging all of it, though,” Mami retorts, golden eyes narrowed as she idly twirls a musket about in her hand.

Homura shakes her head and then, just like that, she’s gone in the blink of an eye, left for who knows where. Mami turns her back to the now-empty space. “You saw that, Kyubey?”

The four-legged creature emerges from the shadows, then sits down a few yards from Mami’s feet. His face remains still as stone, mouth unmoving as he speaks, “I saw it all. How curious.”

“She’s weird alright.” Mami sighs in agreement. She holds her arm out and lets him leap onto it, begins to move in the direction of the nearest witch.

* * *

four.

* * *

A witch appears in the heart of the town, weeks after both Homura and Madoka have both mysteriously disappeared.

Sayaka thinks nothing of it until she buries her blade deep into the entity’s chest, listens as it croaks in its dying moments,

_“Homura…”_


End file.
